In the spirit of helping us carry on and get back to normal after our house fire, and having better foresight than yours-truly, my buddy Dave contacted me in early last summer about the fall hunting season.

“So, have you thought about rifles yet? Now is the time to prepare.”

“Pshaw,” I thought, “it’ll only take a day.” Then, after implementing one of my newly acquired skills — namely giving the situation some careful thought and considering others’ opinions before opening my foot-trap — I realized he’s right. I usually assume a project will be quick and easy. Then I allow just enough time for a best-case scenario, only to be stressed and have to come up with a for-now solution that I make do with forever.

“What kind of gun are you getting?” asked Dave.

“Dunno,” I replied. “Good question.”

“What caliber?” he asked.

Same reply. Hmmm.

“How are you going to pull the trigger?”

See above.

I guessed I’d better get on it — four months will pass fast. I mentioned this time I’d like a bolt-action, smaller-caliber rifle that is accurate and fun to shoot. My old rifle, “The Cannon,” was a Browning semi-automatic 300 Winchester Magnum. It was large, heavy and booming. The noise made it less than comfortable to target shoot with, although its aim was accurate for the 20 years that I used it. Dave let me know that his nephew is a good researcher, and he chose a Browning 6.5 Creedmore rifle.

Being old as dirt, I hadn’t heard of this relatively new caliber. I did some reading — imagine that — and it looked good. It is a little slower than the 300, a little more bullet-drop until long range, and it uses smaller ammo. The recoil, or “kick,” is much less — as is the noise. The accuracy is exceptional, and it is chosen quite often for long-range target shooting, which is something I’ve always wanted to get into. Our little town is blessed with a first-class sport shop, and a call to the owner, Pud, was in order.

“Hi, Wheels,” said Pud. In a small town everybody has a nickname, and some have real names, too … I think. “Sorry about the house fire. What can I do for you?”

“I need a rifle that’s smaller and more fun than the 300 and was thinking a 6.5 Creedmore bolt action,” I said. “Whutcha think?”

“It’s getting to be a popular caliber, with its light recoil and accuracy. What’re you doing with it?”

“Targets and deer hunting, nothing that needs a cannon,” I reply. “The 300 was getting to be no fun.”

“Sounds good. Come to the back alley and I’ll show you a few different models,” he says.

After looking at the different models, I settled on a bolt-action Browning with a Nightforce scope suitable for long-range plinking, and I took it home the next day. I didn’t have a trigger-puller yet, so another friend, Joe, offered to sight-in the gun since we were both camping at the farm and had targets set up. Soon he was hitting bullseyes regularly.

Over the summer, Dave and I devised and 3D-printed many different ideas for a trigger-puller. Most worked, but the bicycle cable that pulled the trigger would not reset after shooting, creating a dangerous situation when a fresh cartridge is loaded in. I got quite a bit of shooting in while we tested and could unfailingly hit a 4-by-4-inch plate at 200 yards, but I was always concerned with the safety factor.

A Breakthrough

One day while searching the internet, I read a post about a quadriplegic who uses a BMF Activator, which fires the gun when you turn the crank. These are illegal now where I am, but after some searching, I found a pattern online to 3D print it. This pattern allowed me to look at the innards and design a single-shot version that accommodates my bicycle-cable and clothespin setup.

Dave and I printed, tested, swore and tinkerbleeped in that order. Finally, a week before hunting season, we had it. We tried dry-firing indoors, and the trigger reset. Several more tries later and it still went perfect.

Then, as I pretended to line up on something, my hand slipped. The gun fired accidently! I sent off a volley of expletives to solidify my displeasure — words like “shucks” and “darn it,” or maybe even worse.

My hand had set off the gun by sliding the whole mechanism back, a situation that was totally unforeseen by us, even though we tested lots to try and expose flaws. Then Dave had to go and couldn’t return until the opening day of hunting.

Opening day arrived.

“I can come by at 3,” Dave texted.

“I think I’ve printed a solution, making it impossible to accidently fire. If it works, it’ll be a quick add-on with a glue gun,” I replied.

Dave showed up at 3 p.m. By 3:30 the piece was glued on and appeared to prevent any movement.

“If we get 10 safe dry-fires, let’s go hunting,” said Dave.

We commenced mimicking real-world shooting, complete with all of the obligatory fiddle-farting I must complete before placing a shot.

“One,” said Dave.

More fiddling.

“Two.”

Bang trigger with my paw on purpose … no misfire.

“Three.”

And so it went, until we reached 10. No accidental firing and no problems firing it when I wanted.

“Let’s go! Only a little time left for today,” he said.

We decided to hunt in our never-before-setup-blind (of course) to “quickly” be hunting. The blind turned out to be a tad short and small for two full-size-and-then-some guys, and a power chair with a rifle mounted. I situated myself, and Dave set the blind over me with the zipper undone. I had a crack to poke the barrel out of. We left my bolt open to be safe — Dave would close it if a deer came by.

“It’d be nice to get one while it’s warm out, since we have no heated garage this year,” said Dave.

“Agreed.”

At 4:30 or so I looked through my little crack and saw something move.

“Dave, there’s a deer. Crank one in!” Dave bolted my rifle.

It was a nice whitetail with three points on each side. I lined up like we practiced and the trigger-puller worked perfectly. It was the first time ever that we scored on opening day! We went from afternoon tinkering and testing to harvesting a nice deer, all within a couple of hours.